Many people opt for installing a second hard drive as opposed to replacing the primary which can involve having to rebuild your whole computer.
If you’re going to install an additional hard drive there are a few points to consider.
The additional hard drive will probably be a newer model than the original, so the chances are it will be faster, this means the more you can run from it as opposed to the original disk the faster things will be; software such as applications, storing files, and even moving the page file onto the new disk.
This will not only increase the speed of the page file, but will free up space on the original hard drive as well as not having to access the files and the page file from the same drive.
Installing a second hard drive is generally a very easy task
Make a note of the make and model of the original and additional hard drive
Making sure that the computer has its power cable removed, remove the side panel, then run a SATA data cable from the motherboard to the new hard drive, and connect a power cable, secure the drive (normally requires two small screws) and the drive is now installed.
Put the cover back onto the pc and re-connect the power cable.
Power on the computer and access the computers BIOS this normally accessed by hitting the F2 or Delete key on startup.
Once in the BIOS look for the drives section and ensure that your original hard drive is set higher than the new additional hard drive in the boot order. (use the note of the hard drives you created earlier to double check the right drive will boot first)
Allow the computer to boot up and then right click on Computer or My Computer, select Manage, Disk Management.
You should now see the new additional hard drive, currently it will not be setup and will have no drive letter assigned.
Right click on it and select Create Partition/Simple Partition accept the defaults, once finished right click on it again and select Format, make sure that NTFS and Quick format are selected and accept the rest of the settings.
After a 30 seconds or so it should finish, and will assign a drive letter, the drive is now ready for use.
Notes
Second hard drive not showing up
If this is the case power off the computer and ensure that power and data cables are connected properly.
Check to make sure the hard drive can be seen in the BIOS, it might require enabling, and if the drive cannot be seen you need to check if it is actually spinning or making any noises, which may indicate a hardware fault with the drive itself.
When checking to see if the drive is spinning or making noises, only attempt this if you are earthed and are familiar with performing this type of procedure.
If you need further assistance installing a second hard drive or with any points within this article please use the site search.
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